


champagne problems

by redlipstightskirt



Category: The 1975 (Band)
Genre: Homophobia, I'm Sorry, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Sad Ending, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-14 04:41:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29165115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redlipstightskirt/pseuds/redlipstightskirt
Summary: I never was ready so I watch you goOr, where Matty can't bring himself to give the answer they both wantInspired by the song Champagne Problems by Taylor Swift, although this deviates a bit from the storyline of the song
Relationships: George Daniel/Matthew Healy
Comments: 4
Kudos: 4





	champagne problems

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! I haven't written fanfic in so long and this is my first time writing for AO3 or this pairing. But recently I've been kind of inspired, so here I am. I think the tense might be a bit off in places but please bear with it :D

_you took the night train for a reason, so you could sit there in this hurt_

As the train sped through the dark night, there was a young man sitting with his head in his hands. Occasionally he tried to look up and take everything in, but he almost immediately went back to how he’d been before. Luckily the train was almost empty, so there wasn’t anyone around to wonder how he was, or worse, approach him. Getting out had been a very rash decision, he just couldn’t bear to be there anymore. So here he was, alone speeding through somewhere he couldn’t begin to recognise at this time of night.

He had too much to think about anyway. He’d had so much hope for that evening, a hope that it would be the official start of the happiest time of his life. He’d hoped that that one word would be the answer to the question he’d been both excited and terrified to ask. He’d spent so much time planning and practising how he’d get the words out, wondering if Matty would interrupt him out of sheer joy. But despite all the practice runs, it never occurred to him to prepare for the response he received.

George felt his eyes burn with the memory of it all. Somehow it felt like a very long time ago, even though it had really only been a couple of hours. He’d spent those couple of hours breaking apart more and more, feeling like he was a glass ornament that had been carelessly dropped and had then smashed into a million pieces all over the floor. And now he was without the one person he always used to be able to rely on to pick everything up and put him back together. 

And the worst part was that he understood why. It was a big ask: a lot of his family and friends didn’t even know Matty existed, and those that did thought he was bad news. And maybe they were right. After all, it had been his answer that had broken George into the mess he was in now. At this point, he gave up and let the tears fall. He didn’t have anyone to hide it from. If he wanted to, he could bawl for as long as it took for him to feel better and no one would be any the wiser. He wasn’t sure whether being alone was welcome or not, although he was grateful for the silence.

_because i dropped your hand while dancing, left you out there standing_

Maybe he should have seen it coming. He’d brought up the vague idea before, only for Matty to suddenly become all shifty. ‘’Your family either don’t know me or don’t like me.’’ he’d said. ‘’It would be weird.’’ George had left it after that, and things went back to normal. Or as normal as they could be, when you had to hide the boy you loved so desperately from many of the other people in your life. He loved Matty so much, and knew that he felt the same way back. Even if they never officially put a proper recognition on it, he knew they’d be happy to have each other forever.

The two of them spent most of their time together. They’d spent Christmas and birthdays and so many other random days with Matty's family, and as much as George loved those days, he always felt slightly sad that he’d never be able to do the same. Matty's family had been perfectly accepting of him being into men, whereas George himself had never even brought it up with a lot of his family. Hence why he was in the position of being in a relationship with someone he’d never been able to even mention, let alone marry.

The days went by as they always had, with the two of them falling more and more in love with each other as time went on, but George still couldn’t shake the feeling that something wasn’t right between them. All relationships have their ups and downs, and certainly they had had their fair share of screaming matches followed by tears and love to make it up to each other. Still, he spent most of his days feeling blissfully happy, and feeling like he and Matty were the only people on earth. He would have been happy if that was the case, and he no longer had the problem of an unaccepting family.

Matty knew that there was something wrong too, and he knew in his heart that as much as he loved George, they couldn’t go on like this, although he had done a pretty good job pretending everything was ok. Certainly George had mostly believed him. They still gave each other drunk kisses on the dancefloor, and laughed each other into bed every night, just as they always had. But George had begun to notice that Matty was sometimes more reluctant to hold his hand in public, and that he just wasn’t himself. They were lying to each other and unfortunately the truth ended up coming out at the worst possible time.

_sometimes you just don't know the answer till someone's on their knees and asks you_

But what George didn’t know is that Matty had desperately wanted to say yes. He wanted nothing more than to spend the rest of their lives together. But that would have come at a cost- their relationship was already a secret to most of George's family, there was no way they’d be able to make it work without making a massive sacrifice of essentially cutting them off completely. And as much as Matty wanted that, he just couldn’t bring himself to do that to him. He kept thinking about ‘if you love something, set it free’, in this case setting George free to find someone that he didn’t have to hide.

And that was the reasoning he gave. After George had finally got the words out, there’d been a slight silence at first, where Matty's heart went through too many emotions for him to even begin to describe. His expression had remained calm, until he managed to choke out ‘’I can’t let you do this. I want to but I can’t. I can’t let you hide us forever.’’ He had to fight hard to stop the tears from falling and his voice from cracking, and he had no idea whether it was successful. All he knew is that his voice and head were saying no but his heart desperately wanted to say yes.

George had just looked up at him, clearly going through just as many emotions as Matty was. ‘’I don’t care about that. You’re the one I want to spend my life with. I don’t care what anyone else thinks.’’ He had wanted the answer to be yes, and he’d prepared himself for Matty wanting some time to think about it. But even though he had known it probably wouldn’t be smooth sailing, he would never have expected a flat out no, regardless of the reasoning. Despite the blank look on George's face, Matty could see how heartbroken he was, and he was suddenly overcome by a horrible mix of guilt and his own heartbreak.

‘’I care.’’ Matty had whispered, just loud enough for them both to hear. ‘’You deserve better than me. You deserve someone you can take home to your family and show off and love, and I’m not that person. I’m sorry.’’ And then just as suddenly he couldn’t be in there anymore. He knew it wasn’t what either of them wanted, not really, but at the same time he couldn’t let George put himself through what it would take. He’d looked back over his shoulder briefly, and immediately regretted it as he saw George stood there looking numb, more than anything else. Matty let a sob escape but couldn’t bear to stay after what he’d done.

_but you'll find the real thing instead, she'll patch up your tapestry that i shred_

And just like that, that was the end of George and Matty. Matty was all over the place dealing with the emotional contradictions- he’d left George out of love, genuinely believing that letting him go so he could find someone he truly deserved, someone that he didn’t have to hide, was the right thing to do. But at the same time, he couldn’t get the look on George's face out of his head. Matty thought of him a lot, and no matter which happy memory he went to, it always turned into the last image he had of him, the one where he was stood looking like his heart had been physically ripped from his chest.

George himself on the other hand hadn’t had the headspace for any emotions at first, the grief and shock were too much. He spent the journey home totally alone, and somehow managed to get home and into his bed. He instinctively rolled over and buried his face in what used to be Matty's pillow, and that smelled of him, mostly of that ridiculous ‘rainforest’ scented shampoo that he always insisted on using. Maybe someday that smell would bring back a kind of nostalgic happiness, but right now George's mind was too blurred with sadness to think of the future, or to feel anything other than feeling sure that he’d feel like this forever.

He stayed like that for a few days, which turned into a few weeks, and then a few months. And then things got easier, but the hardest part was not being able to be honest about why he was hurting so badly. He had no way to explain how he hadn’t been able to spend his life with the person he still loved more than anyone else in the world, given that half of his family had no idea that Matty had even existed. But that didn’t stop him from trying to move on. He went on so many dates, and even though he could get past the idea of forcing himself to date a woman, he couldn’t get past the fact that no one could ever come close to Matty.

George knew his family would want to see him with a wife, and he truly tried. After what felt like the longest time of his life, he finally found someone he liked. He genuinely enjoyed her company and could just about picture them being together forever, even though his mind was still clouded with images of Matty. Those never truly went away but they did begin to fade, slowly. And one day at a time he managed to start putting his life back together. He still had a few pictures of him, both physical (he had a photobooth picture of them both tucked in his wallet) and in memory, and wasn’t prepared to let those go. But eventually he began to move onto a time of celebration and even some truth, and let himself move past, but never forget, the boy who would always have his heart.

_you won't remember all my champagne problems_


End file.
